The book “The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks” dives into the story of an African-American woman who was diagnosed with cervical cancer and died at a young age shortly after, leaving behind 5 children, a husband, and many cousins. When Henrietta was at John Hopkins being treated for her cancer, the doctors took a sliver of her tumor and cultured it to see if they could make the cell “immortal”. This all happened back in the 50’s when colored people weren’t seen as equal citizens to white people. Because of this, doctors withheld a lot of information, and they took the sliver from her without her consent and supposedly never told her about it. (Although there was one colleague who claimed that Gey did in fact tell Henrietta about the cells,
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It talks about each of her children and where they are now and what kind of trouble they got into. Skloot becomes close friends with Henrietta’s daughter, Deborah. This is apparent in how much she is in the story.
Henrietta Lacks unknowingly made a huge contribution to science and got very little credit for it until many years later. Even then when she got credit for it, no one knew much about her. It’s important that a book came out about Henrietta because without her contribution to science, we could potentially be decades behind where we are now. With genetic mapping and learning how chromosomes work – who knows when that could’ve been discovered without her contributions! Henrietta Lacks is a name that deserves to be known and her story deserves to be known as …show more content…
Before reading this book, I knew a lot already about the HeLa cells and what kind of scientific advancements came from them. But, even though I knew a lot about HeLa, I didn’t know much about Henrietta Lacks. It demonstrates that behind a lot of our scientific advancements, there’s a real person who made that happen. Especially in Henrietta’s case, where she was unknown until after she had died, it’s important for people to hear about her and to hear her story because she was unable to share it herself. It was a very good book, and I highly recommend that anyone entering into any health profession should read this book and learn about Henrietta Lacks, not just the HeLa
It talks about each of her children and where they are now and what kind of trouble they got into. Skloot becomes close friends with Henrietta’s daughter, Deborah. This is apparent in how much she is in the story.
Henrietta Lacks unknowingly made a huge contribution to science and got very little credit for it until many years later. Even then when she got credit for it, no one knew much about her. It’s important that a book came out about Henrietta because without her contribution to science, we could potentially be decades behind where we are now. With genetic mapping and learning how chromosomes work – who knows when that could’ve been discovered without her contributions! Henrietta Lacks is a name that deserves to be known and her story deserves to be known as …show more content…
Before reading this book, I knew a lot already about the HeLa cells and what kind of scientific advancements came from them. But, even though I knew a lot about HeLa, I didn’t know much about Henrietta Lacks. It demonstrates that behind a lot of our scientific advancements, there’s a real person who made that happen. Especially in Henrietta’s case, where she was unknown until after she had died, it’s important for people to hear about her and to hear her story because she was unable to share it herself. It was a very good book, and I highly recommend that anyone entering into any health profession should read this book and learn about Henrietta Lacks, not just the HeLa